July 26 Veterans Recall Fidel Castro’s Firm Certainty in Revolutionary Victory

A group of combatants of the July 26, 1953
assaults on the Moncada and Carlos Manuel de Cespedes barracks, and
Granma Yacht expedition members highlighted Fidel Castro’s firm
certainty in the victory of the Cuban Revolution against the Batista
dictatorship that ruled the country before January 1, 1959.

The veterans held a meeting with workers of the Cuban Friendship
Institute (ICAP) at the Friendship House in Havana as part of activities
marking the 56th anniversary of the heroic actions undertaken against
the Batista army barracks in the cities of Santiago de Cuba and Bayamo.

Moncada Combatant and expedition member Emilio Albertosa Chacon pointed
out that Fidel always had and promoted faith in the future to carry out
the two historic actions, as he did during their incarceration at the
then Isle of Pines (today Isle of Youth) and later during the journey of
the Granma yacht towards Cuba and the combats waged on the Sierra
Maestra Mountain Range.

The meaning of the legacy was also addressed by combatants Arsenio
Garcia Davila and Gilberto Garcia Alonso along many others.

Fidel Castro led the expedition, onboard a yacht named Granma, from
Mexico to eastern Cuba in order to begin the guerrilla fight against the
Fulgencio Batista dictatorship. The yacht as well as other artifacts,
planes and cars that played a role during the Cuban liberation war are
preserved at Havana’s Revolution Museum.

ICAP President Kenia Serrano explained about the institution, founded
December 30, 1960 to welcome an increasing number of friends of Cuba,
who came to Cuba in those days in order to learn of the developing
revolutionary process.

Serrano said that the ICAP is a social organization that maintains
relations with over 2, 000 friendship-with-Cuba associations in 149
countries, plus 347 committees actively working in 112 nations for the
release of the five Cuban antiterrorist fighters held in US prisons for
over 10 years now.

July 26 central commemorations will be held next Sunday in the eastern
city of Holguin with the attendance of some 200, 000 citizens, meanwhile
Cubans in all cities of the country will join the celebrations with
rallies in different localities and neighborhoods inspired by the
revolutionary victories and determined to keep developing the socialist
project they once chose.